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Re: Maxant Honey Pump

I am a dealer for Maxant and talked to them. Bottom line, they don't know. No flies on Maxant. They are really good about standing behind their products. They say the pump will only pump 1 GPM. That is based on recollection of a calculation done 40 years ago by someone who is no longer in the picture. They have no anecdotal information from actual users. My motor RPM/pump output capacity/pulley size calculations indicate 6.86 GPM with a 1 HP motor. They are using an underpowered 1/3 HP HVAC blower motor but they are using a double jack pulley system. Even with the undersized motor the pump ought to do 2+ gallons a minute. The only anecdotal information I have from actual users is 1.6 GPM pumping under heavy load through an in-line filter and 2 to 2.5 GPM in a hot honey room, high moisture honey, low load situation. I am hoping someone else using the Maxant pump will post their experience.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Thanks for the reply THALL. That's more than I (or Maxant) thought it would do. I'm wondering about the following specifics:

1) Are you running 1" lines all the way or close nippling on both sides of the pump and running 1-1/2" or 2" lines?
2) What is the average moisture level of the honey you are pumping?
3) How high are you having to pump it vertically into your tanks?
4) How do you have your pump anchored to the floor (not at all, lagged into the slab, blocked in but not lagged, etc.)
5) How are you uncapping (some of the guys using chain uncappers get slower rates due to the real small wax bits that get past the sump)?

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

I am not familiar with this exact pump but I have been researching these pump beads. The potential performance is greatly affected by:
Required lift-always try tokeep the pump lower than the supply or "charge" the supply side witbwith a pusher pump-maybe a hand version. The viscosity/weight is the real problem.
Run at the proper rpm so the liquid does not cavitate inside the pump. The thicker the fluid and or the higher the lift the lower the rpm needed. If this pump is a true 1" gear pump I would think a 1 1/2 HP pump would providea lot more volume than what has been posted.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Originally Posted by challenger

The potential performance is greatly affected by:...

And the type of pump.
I used these pumps on high viscous water based conductive adhesives.https://www.gvc.net/c/5201/sine-pump-parts
The whole issue with pumping viscous materials is getting the material to the push side of the pump. If you can successfully do that than you can push it anywhere with just horsepower. These pumps are food grade easy to clean and keep clean but I don't suspect that there are many used in the honey industry because of their cost. However, they are well suited for the application.
These pumps were the only pump design that was capable of doing the job for adhesives because of their low shear action.

I am just curious but has anyone measured the viscosity of honey before and after it has been pumped? I suppose thinning the honey down is not a negative for most consumers.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

No I mean thinning down by mechanical shear. Nothing is added (like water). If you were to compare the viscosity before pumping and after pumping it would have to be at the same temperature to make a true comparison.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Originally Posted by Acebird

No I mean thinning down by mechanical shear. Nothing is added (like water). If you were to compare the viscosity before pumping and after pumping it would have to be at the same temperature to make a true comparison.

Thinning by shear would suggest to me, and remember I am by no means any authority on pumps, that cavitation is taking place no? The only other way it could be thinned by shear would be due to heat caused by friction-again a guess??

In speaking with an engineer at a large pump manufacturing company it was explained to me that the problem with pumping high viscosity liquids, as you suggest, is getting the liquid to the push side BUT I was also told that a gear pump, in a high viscosity application, will have trouble lifting the liquid (head???). This person was very helpful & informative and thought the gear pump would be helped greatly with some sort of pusher pump or having the liquid supply placed level with, or above, the pump inlet. He also said that cavitation is large issue in determining the pump size and rpm.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Supply side is always level with pump in an extraction situation because the honey is being pumped from a sump where the outlet is about the same height as the supply side of the pump. Cavitation is caused by the honey not being able to fill the void caused at the inlet by the pump fast enough. This problem is alleviated by warm honey (85 F or above), close nippling on both sides of the pump and going up 1 or two hose sizes right at the nipple, and making sure the float switch turns off the pump before the honey level gets below the top of the sump outlet. No need to reinvent the wheel. There are plenty of good honey pumps on the market. I am just trying to find out if anyone has personal, real world, anecdotal experience with the 1" Maxant honey pump.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Originally Posted by challenger

it was explained to me that the problem with pumping high viscosity liquids, as you suggest, is getting the liquid to the push side BUT I was also told that a gear pump, in a high viscosity application, will have trouble lifting the liquid (head???).

All pumps have trouble lifting the liquid (head). This is the vacuum side and with a high viscous material you don't want to lift it you want a positive pressure on the vacuum side. You achieve that by placing the pump at the bottom of a vessel with a very large opening to the suction side. In some cases you place it in the bottom of the vessel like a sump pump. cavitation occurs when the pump moves faster than the material can fill the vacuum chamber. This is easily solved by choosing a bigger pump and slowing it down. Although it may not be so easy to pay for it because the bigger pump will cost more. A gear pump has a very small vacuum chamber so it is a poor choice for a high viscous material. Although a gear pump is not considered a high shear pump in comparison to a sign pump the shear is quite large.

If all you are looking for is a transfer pump then I would look into a pneumatic piston pump or maybe a large diaphragm pump. These are good for transfer but as you would expect they pulsate.
Sorry Howard but most of your guesses are wrong. Shearing has nothing to do with cavitation. Shearing is the sliding of two solid parts with a thin layer of fluid between. It might be easier to visualize in any lubricant application. In the case of pumping honey the honey is the lubricant that gets pinched between two surfaces that are moving in opposite directions. The cavity of a gear pump is very small when compared to the surface area that is in contact with the honey so there would be a lot of shearing of the honey.
If you look at the packers point of view this shearing is a benefit. After all they are trying to ultra filter the honey so the thinner they can get it the easier it is to push it through fine filters. If no body complains that the honey runs like water then they got it made. Some people may be suspicious that they added water but I doubt that that is the reason that it is thinner.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

It appears from the picture that they have this pump slowed down to maybe 300 rpm. The large pulley looks 6X larger than the motor pulley. The page states that the inlet/outlet are 1" which suggests it is a 1" gear pump.. I would guess it is an Oberdorfer 700N or equivalent. I didn't take the time to look for the specs so I can't tell what the performance is. In my experience Maxant makes top quality equipment and this pump appears to be a good value. I too would be interested in hearing from someone that has one.

I am confused about your statement about shear & honey. Are you saying that the gear pump WILL cause thinning of honey by the shearing action? It appears so because you go on to say that packers benefit from this shearing???

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Originally Posted by challenger

Are you saying that the gear pump WILL cause thinning of honey by the shearing action?

I am saying that is what happens with other hi viscosity water based materials. Whether it happens with honey (I suspect it does) I have no proof. If someone wants to check to see if the breakdown would be significant it can easily be proven. Take some raw honey and run it through the gear pump. Fill one jar with pumped honey and one with raw honey. Drop a ball of the same diameter in each jar at the same time and see if the pumped honey reaches the bottom first. To make a fare comparison you should probably let both jars stand for an hour to make sure that they are both at the same temperature.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Originally Posted by tommyt

BTT

I found that honey viscosity is 10,000 cps

It will very greatly with moisture content and temperature and also the floral content. Any gear pump will create shear in the fluid. Shear will breakdown viscosity of a thick fluid. Ultra filtered honey is bound to be thinner then its raw honey state.

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

Re: Maxant Honey Pump

The pumps that are used right now I would consider reasonable because they have been used for so long. They may not be what you want to pay for it. All of the food grade pumps that I have used are way beyond the price of a honey pump. You best bet is to try and find something used.

Maybe you can get lucky and find something used in the food industry like these.